A report released by the Praja Foundation, an NGO, said Wednesday that the exodus of students from government-run schools in Mumbai has not stopped.

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation's ploy to distribute freebies such as tablet computers in civic schools is only a "cosmetic" measure, and it does not help provide "quality education", it said.

As per the report, in 2013-14, 4.01 lakh students (45 per cent of all students) were enrolled in municipal schools, which dropped to 2.97 lakh (37 per cent) in 2017-18.

"Enrolment in all types of schools in Mumbai has fallen by 11 per cent in last five years while percentage share of the private unaided and unrecognised schools has risen significantly," said Nitai Mehta, Founder and Trustee, Praja Foundation.

Milind Mhaske, director of the Praja Foundation, said while the number of schools with upto 100 students increased in the last five years from 311 in 2013-14 to 426 in 2017-18, 229 schools have closed in the last ten years due to no enrolment or students getting transferred to another school.

The municipal corporation's education budget has risen 36 per cent from Rs 1,540 crore in 2013-14 to Rs 2,094 crore in 2017-18, he said.

But despite the rise in budget, as per one survey, 94 per cent of the respondents said they would want to shift their children to private schools.

"Sample data collected on School Management Committees (SMC) attendance shows that in 85 per cent of schools in 2016-17 and 83 per cent schools in 2017-18, municipal councillors did not attend even one SMC meeting," said Mhaske, highlighting the apathy of local elected representatives.

Mehta opined that SMC's powers should be increased.

Mehta also clarified that the issue of BMC 'blocking' Praja Foundation's RTI queries has been sorted out, and the present report was prepared on the basis of RTI replies.

In 2017, the BMC administration had allegedly black-listed the foundation claiming that it misinterpreted healthcare data in one of its reports.

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